"It is a great honor for all those who have worked on The Great Gatsby to open the Cannes Film Festival," the director said in a statement.

"We are thrilled to return to a country, place and festival that has always been so close to our hearts, not only because my first film Strictly Ballroom was screened there 21 years ago, but also because F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote some of the most poignant and beautiful passages of his extraordinary novel just a short distance away at a villa outside Saint-Raphaël."

The Great Gatsby will be screened at Cannes in 3-D—only the second such film in the festival's history, following Pixar's Up in 2009.

Last month, the festival, which runs through May 26, annouced that Steven Spielberg will be heading up the 2013 Cannes jury. With DiCaprio also expected to attend, consider this year's fest a reunion of sorts between the star and director, who last collaborated more than 10 years ago on Catch Me If You Can.

Over the past two years, the festival has proved to be a prescient bellwether of buzz films that eventually score big on the awards circuit.

The Artist premiered there in 2011, and last year, Michael Haneke's Amour, which won the coveted Palme d'Or, eventually snagged an Oscar nomination for Best Picture, as well as the award for Best Foreign Language Film.